Easter is really a tale of two gardens.

The first garden was beautiful, but more than just physical beauty, this garden represents all creation as it should be: man and woman made in God’s image, walking intimately with Him.
There is no sin, no brokenness, no sickness, and no death.
This is life as it should be, and it’s beautiful.
The story begins in that garden

God has provided everything they needed in a garden whose beauty is beyond imagination.

Within this garden there was one tree that was off limits. They were not to take and eat from that tree. Adam and Eve, they had a choice- Would they take God at his word? Or would they take control?

They decided to take control, to call their own shots.

The moment that sin enters into the world through this selfish act, immediately there is fear and shame. They were ashamed to be naked, and they ran from God.

Read a little further and there is accusation, blame, and denial between husband and wife. Sin entered the story and so did separation from God. The weight of failure and shame set in, and they hid.

Sin entered into the world in that first garden, and it didn’t stop there. It became an epidemic infecting the hearts and souls of all mankind forever.

Whenever you see confusion, you can be sure that something is wrong. Disorder in the world implies that something is out of place. Usually, at the heart of all disorder you will find man in rebellion against God. It began in the Garden of Eden and continues to this day.
-A.W. Tozer

Our story begins in that first garden because sadly, for many, that’s really all they know. That’s their whole story, at least, so far. All they’ve known is a life filled with disorder and chaos.

That is the story of the first garden.
But…Easter is the story of not just one garden, but two.

Here we see another garden.
Interesting that the first garden initially represented life, but now symbolizes death.
A place where life should have been celebrated, death became victorious.

And now in this garden, the garden tomb, it is clearly a place of death, a place where death has had the final word.

But in this garden, the second garden, death does not get the final word.

There’s great irony in juxtaposing the two gardens:
1. In a place of the earth’s greatest beauty – the Garden of Eden – the hideousness of sin entered the world through human choices spurred by the devil’s deception.
• Out of great light falls great darkness.
• Death was never supposed to be a part of that beautiful place. But through the sin of man, it was.

2. In a place of death, the Garden Tomb – where darkness has its home – the Lord is resurrected and light dawns.
• The darkness of sin obliterated by the Light of the World.
• No one was ever supposed to escape that grave. But through the victory of Christ over sin, He did.

The Bible is the story of two gardens: Eden and Gethsemane.
In the first, Adam took a fall.
In the second, Jesus took a stand. I
in the first, God sought Adam.
In the second, Jesus sought God.
In Eden, Adam hid from God.
In Gethsemane, Jesus emerged from the tomb.
In Eden, Satan led Adam to a tree that led to his death.
From Gethsemane, Jesus went to a tree that led to our life.
-Max Lucado